Prickly social critic James Howard Kunstler once said “suburbs are the embodiment of existential evil.” Critics regularly condemn them as wastelands of cookie-cutter construction, social conformity, anomie, and racial segregation—and yet that’s where 55 percent of Americans live.

The Colorado Attorney General’s Office last week announced the end of a six-year legal battle to force bakery owner Jack Phillips to design cakes that violate his religious convictions. The Colorado Civil Rights Commission voted unanimously to dismiss an administrative action against Phillips and his Lakewood, Colo., bakery, Masterpiece Cakeshop, for refusing to make a custom cake for a gender transition celebration.

In Bossier City, La., school board meetings regularly begin with prayer, yet school employees can’t quietly pray or read a Bible within sight of students.

That’s because a settlement agreed to last week restricts religious expression in public schools in the Bossier Parish area outside Shreveport. In the agreement, filed Jan. 23, the parties agreed some of the school district’s policies or practices violated the U.S. Constitution’s ban on the establishment of religion by endorsing or promoting Christianity. A federal court is expected to approve the settlement.